


Before I Forget

by startrekto221B



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Amnesia, Gen, Johnlock - Freeform, M/M, POV Sherlock Holmes, Science Experiments, Science Fiction, Sherlock Being Sherlock, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-14
Updated: 2014-11-14
Packaged: 2018-02-25 07:19:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,733
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2613125
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/startrekto221B/pseuds/startrekto221B
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Basically Sherlock and John travel back in time and create a paradox when they inadvertently cause the death of John's grandfather.<br/>***<br/>“You realize, of course, that the ‘Grandfather Paradox’ is a purely theoretical problem, and has no actual solution that I can look to?” I wave my hand dismissively in his general direction. </p><p>“It isn’t theoretical now, Sherlock,” he points out testily, “No, I’d say it’s pretty real. Now, I was the one who wanted to travel into the future, where we wouldn’t have this problem. But no, that didn’t seem like a good course of action to Mister I-built-the-damn-time-machine-and-I-choose-when-we-go.”<br/>***</p>
            </blockquote>





	Before I Forget

“You realize, of course, that the ‘Grandfather Paradox’ is a purely theoretical problem, and has no actual solution that I can look to?” I wave my hand dismissively in his general direction.

“It isn’t theoretical now, Sherlock,” he points out testily, “No, I’d say it’s pretty real. Now, I was the one who wanted to travel into the future, where we wouldn’t have this problem. But no, that didn’t seem like a good course of action to Mister I-built-the-damn-time-machine-and-I-choose-when-we-go.”

Sighing heavily, I rub my temples and tell him what I have told him at least a thousand times, “If we go into the future we have no idea what to expect. The machine also keeps track of the earth’s revolutions about the sun and I knew exactly what structures were where in 1891. If we went forward we might have materialized in the middle of space—or even better, solid brick!”

“But coming here and inadvertently causing the death of my grandfather was a better option? I see, no, it makes perfect sense, choosing death over death,” he was about to continue but paused, staring at me curiously, “My god I’m not dead yet. Why am I not dead?”

“Good question,” I give out the response that means I don’t have a good answer, and then I retreat back into my own mind.

It was a thought that began this mess. And thought alone could end it. John was driven by action, by the glorious allure of the future. It was I who had longed for the past, and I alone could fix this. So where to begin the thought? With the problem. A voice in my head answers, and I think from there, unraveling various threads of logic that lead to nowhere in the hope of finding the one that doesn’t.

I would say I am at risk of dying due to the sudden change in the continuity of time, but that doesn’t seem appropriate given the fact that I haven’t been born. In fact I won’t be for years to come. It’s a ridiculous way to die, I should think, stuck in the wrong time. Yet to be honest, I feel like now would be the simplest time to just shut up and let the flame of my existence be snuff out. There’s no one who would be particularly torn up about it. No unfortunate funeral, fidgeting kids, long service, dreadful dress code. No one would miss me. Though that’s no fault of mine of course, after all, no one I knew has ever even met me yet. No fault of theirs either, they haven’t been born.

The year here is 1891. You always picture that era as having occurred entirely in sepia. You look at the photos of early factory workers and engineers handling machines and don’t imagine for a second that the life those people lived was just as real and in color as yours is. I’m glad at least, that I was able to come back and observe it for myself. Take one trip through my portal machine and come out unscathed on the other end.

“The machine,” I sit up with a jerk and shake John, “You were supposed to keep an eye on the machine while I figured this out.”

“It’s still out there,” her peers through the window blinds, “Cloaked though, remember? We’re the only ones that can see it. Say, if we went back we could stop ourselves from stopping the train. Use the machine one more time.”

This is what I’ve been afraid of the whole time. It’s a capital mistake to screw something up and then try to fix it by repeating the thing you screwed up. But being bold and screwing things up for himself has always been John’s specialty. Being as it may he is highly capable in his way, he has nevertheless demonstrated a severe inability to process any of my superior logic whatsoever. I remember one June morning when work on the time machine was almost complete and I had lectured him for exactly 2 hours, 34 minutes, and 23 seconds about the dangers of interfering with the natural passage of time. But of course the day that we came we came he stopped a train to save a gutter child who walked onto the tracks, his grandfather walked to work instead when the train pulled in late, and was in what I know to be one of the earliest fatal motorist accidents in history.

“So why am I not dead, Sherlock?” he asks again, “You must have some theory.”

“Do you remember what I’ve told you? Never theorize before you have data. I don’t know why you aren’t dead John.” I say gently.  
He looks at me quizzically, “You said that? I don’t remember that.”

“I must have said it a thousand times, John,” I laugh, remembering the old cases during which I would force him to draw his own erroneous conclusions, “Back in London. In our flat. In our time. I must have said it as some point during our first case: ‘A Study in Pink’.”

“A Study in Pink.” he says, and I can’t tell if it’s a statement or a question.

“Of course,” I’m starting to get worried, “Don’t you remember? Pink phone. Jennifer Wilson, her stillborn daughter Rachel? You shot the cabbie that case. You saved my life.”

“Sherlock, I don’t remember a Jennifer Wilson,” he looks at me, and we both understand.

His memories are fading, I realize. He isn’t dying; he’s being ripped from the fabric of reality a few moments at a time. And since he saved me, so am I. Who knows what I don’t remember? What I’ve already lost.

“It takes two people to pilot the time machine,” he said, “If we’re going to use it to fix this, you need me to remember how to do it.”

“It’s too risky,” I shiver as I realize he is right, that he will grow to forget the skills that brought us here. In time he will forget even me.

“It’s a risk we have to take,” he begins walking out of the room, gesturing for me to follow him, “Please Sherlock, before I forget.”

I follow him out, calculating in my head the exact moment we need to be in to stop ourselves from pulling the cord. We descend the staircase wordlessly and I am the first to reach the machine. I climb in and seat him next to me, engaging the start up sequence we’ve practiced for ages. I put in the time. March 3rd, 1891. 10:45:32 am. I put in the GPS coordinates of the train, just meters from where we materialized the first time. He grabs the knobs on his side, watching the various dials and meters show the machine warming into action.

I grasp his hand, “Next time John, I’ll show you the future. We’ll go back to our own future. Back to 2012 where we belong.”

But I am lucky he has already completed his part of the navigation because his eyes are empty when he looks into mine. I realize I have lost him. I click the rest of the sequence myself and feel the same burst of power that brought us back the first time.  
He protests as I secure him to the chair, making sure he cannot escape as the machine halts at its intended destination in time. I get out and lock him inside, seeing myself and John—or Sherlock Prime and John Prime as I naturally call them—standing in the distance.

There are others on the train but Sherlock Prime and John Prime stick out like sore thumbs. They are cloaked to the others so I alone can see their modern clothes and hairstyles. Any 30s man would gasp at John’s lack of a waistcoat and hat. With my hair on the long side I might be mistaken for a woman.

I debate whether I should approach Sherlock Prime or John Prime to stop John Prime from stopping the train, but I decide taking a chance on myself is just foolish. I need a person of action. Sherlock Prime would consider the logical merits of re-killing the gutter child to save ourselves, take the time required to demand all the facts from me. John Prime would make the snap decision, realizing that in our lifetime the child is long dead already, and that his life could have profound repercussions.

But I have underestimated my own sharpness. Sherlock Prime has spotted me before I can get to him.  
“You are me,” he says in shock, “How could I possibly allow this to happen? What are you-me-us thinking?”

“What do you need us to do?” John Prime cuts to the chase, “Something terrible happened. Or I’d still be with you.”

“You can’t stop the train,” I explain, “If you do, you’ll kill your grandfather. And you will cease to exist.”

“Wait what? Why?” Sherlock Prime asks, “I need to know more than that. What time are you from? I need more data. We can’t just screw around without the continuity of time.”

“Please,” I ignore myself, starting to realize how annoying John has found me over the years, “John, please. Promise me. You won’t stop the train. You’ll go back to the future. It’s our only chance to survive. Promise me. Before I forget.”

“I promise,” John Prime says, then his eyes widen, “I forgot didn’t I. The John from your time is gone, isn’t he?”

I hear the ticking of clocks in my mind. I remember my studies of time but I don’t know what my mother looked like. Whether I even had a brother. I remember the night I left 2012 for 1891 but I don’t remember who the kind looking man with the slight limp—possibly psychosomatic—and tanned wrists is. Surely served in Afghanistan or Iraq. I want to ask him. I see a man who looks exactly like me to his side. Is he my twin?

“Is your John gone?” the soldier asks.  
“John? Who’s John?” I ask, and his face falls.

It is the last thing I feel before I cease to be, that perhaps this John was important to me, that I have lost something I don’t remember having. That I, the genius, the time traveler, just ran out of time.

**Author's Note:**

> *** This is the first piece I've written for this pairing, I just had to after seeing Benedict in Star Trek and remembering all the warped time episodes I've seen in THAT series. Interpret the ending as you wish, I meant for it to be ambiguous whether John and Sherlock Prime do make it back to the right future!


End file.
